Ex-Apple Engineers Find Life After Jobs

Telling the whole world that you used to be big at Apple adds cachet, whether you're applying for a new job or looking for investment money.

In press releases, executives' bios, and investment pitches for Kickstarter or Indiegogo projects, aspirants who can do so never fail to mention the magic phrase "ex-Apple engineer."

Is all this self-congratulation the result of Apple instilling into its engineers some special design regimen or supreme marketing lessons? Or does the public think ex-Apple engineers still operate under the spell of the late Steve Jobs?

Richard Doherty, research director of Envisioneering Group, doesn't take lightly the significant psychological influence Apple has had over its employees. "Each of these engineers not just survived, but thrived in the world's most demanding, fast-turn technology company on the planet," he said. "They saw dreams become products, no's become 'Ship it,' and then did it all over again in the house that Jobs built."

He sees time served at Apple as more than a badge of honor. "It's a certification of engineering tenacity, resiliency, and satisfaction in a design and job well done."

Doherty's analysis certainly validates the mystique of former Apple engineers -- which clearly sets them apart from any other Silicon Valley crew.

However, we suspect that ex-Apple engineers are viewed as attractive, valuable, and a rare commodity largely because they're mysterious. So little is known about them.

Apple is famous for keeping a tight lid on its projects and the individual engineers involved in them, even after the products are launched. The company typically keeps a tight leash on the chosen few who are allowed to speak publicly.

For reporters covering Apple, this is pure agony. Many of the brilliant engineering ideas, decisions, and processes applied to projects at Apple are treated like state secrets. Often, the speculative nature of reports on Apple only helps advance the hype and blow a product's significance out of proportion.

Anonymous Apple engineers, ergo, seem almost pre-ordained to become stars when they quit, switch jobs, or take on new engineering projects.

Well-known Apple alumni like Steve Perlman and Tony Fadell have proven this true by morphing into successful serial entrepreneurs. Others leaped into higher-ranking positions at big companies. After he quit Apple, Andy Rubin co-founded Danger (later acquired by Microsoft). He now works at Google as Mr. Android.

But we believe that a lot of former Apple engineers haven't been equally anointed. They're going through the struggle of starting their own projects, just like any other entrepreneur in the world.

Following are the thumbnails of some ex-Apple engineers we've come across in recent years. Many were indeed brought up at Apple as world-class experts -- by developing software, figuring out display technology, embedding cameras into Apple products, or more broadly managing the supply chain and manufacturing of Apple products. Their experience puts a face on the largely anonymous product development processes at Apple.

The list here is random. But what these engineers are doing today, or what they're seeking to do, offers a taste of what they learned at Apple.

Today the enterprise security is mainly to prevent leaking of business secrets, and for large corporate there will be very tight watch on the existing developments, but besides this one will be getting complete freedom in-term of personal life after eliminating work related technicalities

Very true 11 page article is way too long article for this space. Once could hardly catch all the pages.

Multi-page articles on EETimes are much less accessible and readable than single page articles. Some of the multi-page articles add only a few inches of material with each new page. I'd predict that a significant number of readers drop out after each page transition. Is there a reason why the entire article cannot appear on a single "page"? My scroll bar has no dimensional limits. It seems to me that the reader experience and the amount of text that actually reaches the readers would improve with "full articles on a single page" on-line publishing.

People have always touted their credentials at respected institutions. I don't think that it is unique to the aura of Steve Jobs. We hear about Princeton University graduates, former IBM, Microsoft, GE, Google, or Apple employees. Employers are impressed by people who measured up to the standards of such institutions.

@Sheepdoll well put! I am also perturbed by Satya Nadella's comments. Truth is innovation does not guarantee employment security either! I have seen many companies where good innovations by engineers are often shot down by marketing team for various reasons only to realize later that similar innovations in competing companies brought in handsome rewards! May be Nadella's comments were based on the past performance of Microsoft in product innovations when compared to those of Apple, for example!

You can lose job even at the very very prestigious company, you know, unemployment is very serious question in different nations. People might become discouraged and even talanted and hard-working person can lose a job and become depressed because of unsuccessful searches. If you have lost job, don't become discouraged, just sit and think what can you do. Sometimes resume helps to get job interview and job, too. Try to resort to professional resume writing service (like this one, http://resumewritinglab.com/ ) that can help make your CV more effective and avoid mistakes.

Jayna Sheats -- Although Apple is known for very forward-looking non-discrimination attitudes, I could not help but notice the absence of a single female in this list.

While I have not had the time to read all 11 pages of the article. I have been following the comments here.

When I was at apple between 1992 and 1998 there was absolutely no bias whatsoever. Women in the imaging department were well represented. Even the postscript team which I was part of was at least 50 50 or so. Back then it was not all that important.

Most of the people I worked with had PhDs or Masters. I with a lowly EET certificate had no problems working in this area. Steve had to make the exception himself. So I guess I got my degree the same place he got his.

I got poached by a competitor. Then I turned 40. The main criticism if that is what it is, that I am too expensive, or that I would want to run the company or department.

On the other hand this industry has a really short (18 month) memory. Anything older than that is obsolete.

Satya Nadella's comments on axing 18,000 at Microsoft is disturbing.

"The tech industry, Mr Nadella said in an email to employees last week, "does not respect tradition, it only respects innovation"

Ditto... great article and very motivating. I have worked with Apple engineers in the past as a software vendor and as a colleague in other companies during their post-Apple regime. The stories I heard from them are very similar to what I read above in the article.